PRESIDENT Samia Suluhu Hassan has expressed gratitude to the US Vice -President Kamala Harris for her historic visit to Tanzania.
The Head of State through her official twitter handle said that the visit by the US VP will definitely take Tanzania/USA relationship to greater heights for the benefit of both countries.
Dr Samia assured VP Harris of the government commitment to work on the matters they discussed.
“Thank you, Vice President @KamalaHarris for your historic visit to Tanzania, which will definitely take Tanzania/USA relationship to greater heights for the benefit of both our countries. Rest assured of our commitment to work on the matters we discussed. Karibu tena Tanzania.” Dr Samia tweeted.
Ms Harris arrived in Tanzania on March 29 this year for a three -day visit and was received by Vice- President Dr Philip Mpango and Minister for Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation Dr Stergomena Tax and other government officials.
While in the country, Harris met with President Samia in private talks before holding a joint press conference at the State House in Dar es Salaam. The US VP also visited the National Museum and later paid her respects to victims of a deadly 1998 US Embassy bombing. She left the country yesterday for Zambia as her final stop on her s weeklong trip.
During the press conference the two leaders announced a series of new areas of cooperation to strengthen ties between the two countries.
The areas in which cooperation will be strengthened include commercial engagement, digital connectivity, investment in women and youth, fostering democratic values, food security, marine conservation and health.
“This visit will not only provide opportunity for our countries to strengthen existing relationship, but will also provide platform for new areas of cooperation,” President Samia said.
“I understand that we have signed some Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) including port cooperation and commercial dialogue,” said Dr Samia.
In her remarks, she said each of the agreements had a lot to deal with and Tanzania was going to work on them and identify the key issues in each of them.
“I would like to request one of the most important things from you, which is to ensure that these agreements are fully implemented. Having said that, I want to assure you that the Tanzania government is committed to honouring the agreements that were signed between us,” stated President Samia.
On her part, VP Harris said the Biden-Harris administration was committed to strengthening the relationship between the two countries going forward.
“It is our shared goal to increase economic investment in Tanzania and strengthen our economic ties. To do so I am pleased to announce a series of new initiatives,” Harris said, standing alongside President Samia.
According to her, one of the new initiatives involves Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) and the government of Tanzania signing an MoU to expand the US-Tanzania commercial engagement by empowering US businesses to export quality, innovative goods and services to Tanzania.
She said the MoU, which will facilitate up to 500 million US Dollars equivalent to 1.1tril/- in US export financing to Tanzania, will support exports in a variety of sectors, particularly infrastructure, transportation, climate and energy security, power generation and distribution projects.
Ms Harris further said the MoU will support jobs in both Tanzania and the US, and build on EXIM’s Congressional mandate to increase US exporters’ relationships in sub-Saharan Africa.
“In Tanzania alone, work is currently underway to build a processing facility, the first of its kind in the continent, for minerals that goes into electric vehicle batteries. This will deliver battery grade nickel to the USA and global markets as soon as 2026,” she noted.
Harris said the project was an important and pioneering model using innovative and low emission technology and high labour standard, importantly raw minerals will soon be processed in Tanzania by Tanzanians, it will help address the climate crisis, build resilience global supply chains and create new industries and jobs.
“So, our administration is now working with partners to identify additional opportunities for critical minerals from the region to be processed in this new facility,” said Ms Harris.
In support of the breadth and depth of bilateral engagement between the two countries, the Biden-Harris administration intends to provide 560 million equivalents to 1.3tril/- in bilateral assistance in 2024 fiscal year to Tanzania.